When Shahristani objected to the oil contracts the region signed with international oil companies, dismissing them as illegal, Iraq’s oil revenues were slowly, but effectively, increasing. The budget has also witnessed growth from $50 billion in 2006 to $138 billion in 2013. However, the growing revenues that were achieved due to global economic changes and oil-price leaps did not have any effect on the lives of Iraqis. Development continued to regress while electric power remained absent. This oil-producing country which failed to build new oil refineries started importing its oil derivatives from abroad.
The corruption spreading into the core sectors of the Iraqi government did not effect any tangible change. The big budgets are consequently being absorbed and the conservative bureaucracy has not been able to trace them, despite its claims of greater transparency than Kurdistan in financial management.
There are no secrets here. Instead, there is a will to achieve — a will that that Iraq has been missing for many years.
Mustafa al-Kadhimi is an Iraqi writer specializing in the defense of democracy. He has extensive experience in documenting testimony and archiving documentaries associated with repressive practices. He has written many books, including Humanitarian Concerns, which was selected in 2000 by the European Union as the best book written by a refugee.
(Picture: Erbil Citadel)
RT @iraqbiznews: Iraqi Kurdistan 'Will to Achieve' Key to Success: By Mustafa al-Kadhimi for Al-Monitor. Any op... http://t.co/0WUMxEmOUi
Shahristani is just incompetent as so many ministers in the current government. The combination of incompetence and corruption at minister level ends in a very toxic brew for the Iraqi people. And they all are protected by the law, they are immune!
Not everything is good in Kurdistan, just that they have done less mistakes and some few good things. Nothing extraordinary if you compare with doing things correctly first time.
It is a shame that the electricity situation in Iraq and specially in south of Iraq where there is so much oil that people die because of high temperatures or lack of air conditioning. It is a shame that administrative hurdles stop the oil production and things do not get better if you make politics out of all this.
Another shame is the Central Bank of Iraq, well, we have already too many shames so lets concentrate in getting things done or out of our hands and not letting administrative politicians to ruin this country.